The question that opens the Carrara Biennale (from
June 26th to October 31st), "We return to
recognizing ourselves in new monuments?" takes its cue
from the waning days of large, celebrative public
sculpture.

Is it a definitive eclipse? The answer comes from 30
contemporary artists, including Paul McCarthy,
Antony Gormley, Yona Friedman, Maurizio
Cattelan, Santiago Serra and
Monica Bonvicini, as well as many other
significant figures from the international sculpture scene - along
with up and coming artists like Kristina Norman,
Cyprien Gaillard, Rossella
Biscotti and Giorgio Andreatta Calò. The
artists have been invited to make an evaluation of the surrounding
Carrara landscape, to "touch" the everyday reality
of the city and land that has witnessed centuries of legendary
masters of marble like Michelangelo and
Canova.

There hasn't been a lack of controversy however:
two of the artists summoned to participate have been repeatedly
called desecrating and pleonastic. Maurizio
Cattelan proposed that, for the period during the
Biennale, the statue honoring
Mazzini in the central square of
Carrara be substituted with one dedicated to
Bettino Craxi. After his idea was rejected,
Cattelan decided set his work in the
Monumental Cemetary of
Marcognano, just outside the city walls. And
Paul McCarthy, despite the initial concerns raised
by his proposal, actually managed to use 15 tons of travertine
stone in order to make an enormous sculpture in the shape
of excrement…